


Blame Aphrodite

by AgentStannerShipper



Series: Star Trek Bingo 2020 [14]
Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: Episode: s01e03 The Naked Now, F/F, First Meetings, Genderswap, Getting Together, Implied/Referenced Sexual Harassment, because tasha is very bi and deserves a hot girlfriend, female!Data, like data is hot but fem!data? im dead, people are dicks about female androids for obvious reasons, shes the only one switched, tasha is just slightly a bisexual disaster, the kind youd pretty much expect in any given workplace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-13
Updated: 2020-08-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:21:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25869616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AgentStannerShipper/pseuds/AgentStannerShipper
Summary: Lieutenant Commander Data deserves only the best. Tasha is...well, she wants to be.
Relationships: Data/Tasha Yar
Series: Star Trek Bingo 2020 [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1875274
Comments: 6
Kudos: 16
Collections: Star Trek Bingo Summer 2020





	Blame Aphrodite

**Author's Note:**

> For the bingo prompt "genderswap." I like playing with Data and gender, because a) I'm trans and b) let's be real, gender is a human construct and there's no reason an android has to ascribe to it if I don't want them to. This one is pretty straightforward genderswap though, just a short little fic dedicated to the way TOS regards female androids (I love those episodes but yeesh with the sexbot thing). Teen rating is mostly just in case. It's pretty common for queer women to worry they're being predatory towards other women for showing any interest at all, and some of that bled into Tasha here, but things obviously turn out okay. 
> 
> Title is stolen shamelessly out of context from a poem by Sappho.

Tasha had known she was attracted to women just about as long as she could remember being attracted to anyone. Turkana IV wasn’t exactly the sort of place that made forming attachments easy, but once she’d been brought to Earth, adapting to the promise of safety and comfort without ulterior agendas, she’d been almost astonished at how easy it was for her to find herself drawn in by a pretty face. She hadn’t always acted on it – and sometimes when she had it perhaps hadn’t been in her best interests – but there was something almost overwhelmingly beautiful about the people of Earth. Especially the women.

At first, she’d wondered if it were simply envy. If she had felt they had something she lacked, an ease of navigating forms of femininity, accepting or rejecting them, in ways that Tasha struggled with herself. And perhaps that was part of it, but it was far from the whole. On Turkana, women had often paired up as a matter of survival. To do it in safety, purely for the pleasure of it, had been a novel concept. One which Tasha had adapted to more easily than any other.

So it wasn’t the fact that the _Enterprise’s_ second officer was a woman that had made Tasha’s breath catch in her chest, the star-struck moment washed over suddenly with a wave of confusion. Lieutenant Commander Data was stunning; inhumanly pale, true, and with sharp yellow eyes, but Tasha had seen alien women before, and there was an intensity to that gaze which made Tasha’s heart skip a beat when they shook hands over Picard’s introductions. Her hair was long, still regulation-appropriate, but it reached down to her shoulders, a deep chestnut color, a handful of locks pulled from either side of her head to form a sort of cross between a low ponytail and a bun, the front and sides combed straight back and loose. It shone in the light, and Tasha’s hands twitched with the absurd, unprofessional urge to run her fingers through it.

In fact, the lieutenant commander’s entire figure seemed to shine – or at least, what was visible of it from the uniform. Like Tasha, she apparently favored the jumpsuit over the skant, leaving only her hands and everything from the neck up uncovered. But her skin shimmered, that odd white-gold, and she had long, fine fingers. Her voice was a little lower than Tasha had expected, the cadence a little stiff, but that was far from the most unusual thing about her.

“You’re an android,” Tasha said, the words blunter than she’d intended, still clutching the commander’s hand. Data raised her eyebrows, head cocked.

“As chief of security, you should have been briefed on my mechanical nature.”

“No, I was,” Tasha said quickly. She dropped Data’s hand like it was hot, folding her arms behind her back tightly. “I just…I didn’t expect…”

Off to the side, Tasha could see her new captain suppressing a smile. Data’s eyebrows rose higher. “I have often been told I am not what people expect, although the context does seem to vary.”

“Oh?” It wasn’t a squeak. It absolutely wasn’t. Tasha spoke to beautiful women all the time.

Data nodded. “Commonly, they appear to be impressed with how closely I mimic human functioning.” She paused. “Of course, many also comment that I am ‘unusually attractive for a machine.’”

Tasha choked. “That’s…uh…quite a compliment?”

“Perhaps.” Data did not appear convinced, and Tasha couldn’t exactly blame her, even if it had been exactly what she was thinking. Data was stunning. Tasha had seen holovids, of course, and she’d run training scenarios with schematics, because as security chief it was part of her job to know how to turn Data off if the android ever went rogue, but they didn’t do justice to her presence.

Tasha cleared her throat, schooling herself. Professional. She could be professional. Professionals didn’t drool over their superior officers, especially not to their face, no matter how gorgeous they were. “Well, Commander, I look forward to working with you. I’ve read your Starfleet file. Your work is extremely impressive.”

She didn’t think it was her imagination that Data relaxed a little, her smile small but brightening visibly. “Thank you, Lieutenant. Your file is similarly intriguing.”

Tasha didn’t turn red. She was just unexpectedly warm, that was all. It was a perfectly reasonable explanation.

***

Lieutenant Commander Data deserved better. That was all Tasha could think. They weren’t even a month into their mission, and that already was apparent. Oh, it wasn’t an issue from the senior staff. Picard was polite and formal with all of them, and he clearly had made Data his second officer because he valued her intellect and her opinions. Worf respected her physical prowess and her status as a senior officer. Riker could be flirtatious, but he was rarely serious in it, and he never crossed professional boundaries, and he never second-guessed a good point from the android just because he could. Even Geordi, who was clearly interested in Data as a mechanical being, wasn’t crass or insensitive about it, and had even struck up a close friendship with her as the two bonded over mechanics and other topics. Beverly was polite if a little distant from the bridge crew on the whole, and Deanna could be a little close-minded at times regarding Data’s abilities to experience feeling, but on the whole they were as welcoming and accepting as the rest.

But Tasha could tell that Data felt more than nothing, no matter what anyone – including the android herself – insisted. Because she had seen the difference in Data’s demeanor, the genuine smiles and the polite ones, the way her eyes could harden and her hands curl into loose fists even as she kept her voice even and free of emotion. Those reactions weren’t meaningless. And they were always prompted by a clear and consistent pattern.

Tasha had been a little embarrassed, almost called out, when at their first meeting Data had told her that one of the most common responses to meeting an android was for people to comment on her physical appearance. Tasha wasn’t laughing anymore.

Data was second officer. Tasha was security chief. That meant they were both staples of away missions, and both were heavily involved with interacting with new personnel. Which meant Tasha got to witness a disturbing trend.

People touched Data. A lot. It wasn’t uncommon for someone – male, female, or otherwise, but especially male – to grab her by the arm or the shoulder when meeting her, sometimes even by the chin, turning her this way and that to examine the ‘complexity of the mechanism.’ The touches often lingered, and people always seemed surprised when Data pulled herself away, a clear yank before returning her hands to her side, fingers flexing minutely, jaw set. Even when Data was ranking officer, people often seemed to have trouble addressing her directly, turning to one of the other away team members for instruction. And the comments…some of them were almost innocuous, the kind that most of the female crew got on unfamiliar planets, but others…more than once Tasha had heard a crewman walk away from Data remarking that they hadn’t expected an android who was so visibly not human to be so physically attractive. Some even said it to her face. And there were others…

Tasha used the gym frequently. She enjoyed working out, and for her it was often a social activity, done with Worf when it was any form of combat training, anything in motion, and done with another workout partner when it was on the equipment. That workout partner, increasingly, was Data.

She’d almost passed out the first time she’d seen the android roll up her sleeves to keep them from getting caught in something she was working on. Upon Tasha’s casual suggestion that, even if Data didn’t sweat, if she was going to spot Tasha in the gym she might consider workout clothes to better blend in, Data had taken to doing just that, and while the uniforms they wore were all but shapeless, the workout gear was anything but. The tank top hugged Data’s figure and showed off her arms, and Tasha had to be grateful that the android had opted for the sweats instead of the shorts. She didn’t think her heart could handle it.

But she was professional about it. More than that, Data was her friend. Tasha had so few female friends – more now, with Deanna and Beverly – that she was loathe to do anything to lose one. Data wasn’t just stunningly beautiful, she was sweet, and kind, and smart, and yes, she could miss social cues and at times had a naivete about the world that was heartwarmingly adorable as she checked her reference banks for context, but none of that mattered. Tasha wasn’t going to do _anything_ to jeopardize her friendship with Data. Even if she woke up guilty some nights, dreaming of yellow eyes and long, chestnut hair. It wasn’t worth it. Not when she knew the kinds of things people said about Data behind her back.

It was probably good that Data didn’t sweat. She had no reason to use the locker rooms after they were done at the gym. She’d wait outside if she waited for Tasha at all, and that was just as well, because more than once after a workout session Tasha had heard people laughing, ribbing each other and making suggestions about Lieutenant Commander Data’s functions. After all, more than one of them had pointed out, who made a female android, _especially_ one who looked like that, without sex in mind?

Tasha never relayed those conversations to Data. She didn’t need to. She was pretty certain that Data already knew.

“How do you deal with it?” she asked once, when they were working on reports together in Tasha’s quarters. Data had simply cocked her head.

“Their points are logical,” she said. “It is not common to design female androids. That is why ‘android’ is the common term, as in ‘resembling man.’ And when gynoids are constructed, it is frequently by men, frequently with that particular goal in mind. Literature from your history as far back as Ancient Earth can attest to that.”

“Yeah, but…” Tasha grit her teeth in frustration. She took a deep breath. “Doesn’t it bother you? That they’re making those assumptions?”

Data gave a partial shrug. Here, in Tasha’s quarters, she was dressed for off duty, the ends of her hair brushing against the red checked flannel she’d shrugged on. She looked…somehow softer like this. A little smaller. Like she’d been holding onto a tension, and it had somehow been released. She looked good on Tasha’s sofa, and Tasha didn’t even mean it crudely. She just…looked like she belonged there, in Tasha’s quarters. Protected. Being soft.

“They are correct assumptions,” Data said quietly. “I am fully functional in that respect. My sexuality programming is…extensive.”

“That doesn’t mean you were made for other people’s pleasure,” Tasha insisted.

The look Data gave her was unreadable. “That is true,” she said at last. “I was designed to be intelligent. I believe my creator intended me to be a scientist, and I do find great enjoyment in my work. However, no amount of success in my work is likely to prevent these assumptions from being made. I do not have to like them, but there is little I can do to stop them. Therefore, ignoring them seems the only practical approach.”

“You could tell the captain about it,” Tasha pointed out. But even as she said it, and Data raised her eyebrows, Tasha knew that was pointless. Picard would care, of course he would, but there was only so much he could do. The admiralty wasn’t likely to approve that many transfers, especially not if that was what it was for. Tasha had seen the holovids of Data from her early days at Starfleet. To say she’d been treated like an object, a scientific curiosity, was putting it mildly. It wasn’t likely they’d put the feelings of one android over dozens of other Starfleet officers. Especially when they didn’t seem to think Data had any.

***

Tasha was fairly certain she was going to be sick. It wasn’t from the polywater, strictly speaking. Doctor Crusher’s hypo had blissfully been hangover-free. No, the only thing that was turning Tasha’s stomach now was the memory of just a few hours ago, of taking Data’s hands in hers, running her fingers through that silky hair like she’d always wanted to, Data’s lips soft and pliant against her own, the android drunk and receptive to her touch. The polywater infection had made Tasha bold in a way she’d fought so hard to keep under wraps, and it wasn’t fair. Data had deserved better than that.

She pulled the android aside after shift, her voice low when she asked, “Hey. Can we talk?”

Data cocked her head, tucking a lock of hair back behind her ear again as it fell lose. “Of course.”

Tasha halted along the wall, stepping out of the center of the corridor and into one of the alcoves. Data followed, her brow furrowing slightly. Tasha’s mouth tasted like ash and cotton, her throat thick and dry. “I’m sorry,” she said finally, when the words came again. “If you want to press charges against me, I’ll submit to them.”

Data’s eyes widened. Her confused expression deepened. “I…do not understand. Why would I wish to press charges against you?”

“My behavior was completely inappropriate.” Tasha swallowed hard. “I know…I know how much of that you get from everyone else, and it’s not okay that I took advantage of you like that-“

“Tasha,” Data interrupted. Tasha fell silent. Data’s voice was quiet, appropriately discreet for the setting, but she appeared largely bewildered. “You did not take advantage of me. You were under the influence of the polywater virus. If anything, I took advantage of you, given that I was not infected until you touched me, and yet was still receptive to your drunken advances.”

“I tried to _seduce_ you,” Tasha said, baffled. “I…I came onto you, even though you’re my _friend_ and my superior officer, and-“

“You are attracted to me.”

It drew Tasha up short. She gaped. “I…”

Data raised her eyebrows. “Is this an incorrect assessment?”

“I…no. How did you-“

“I have been aware since our initial introduction.” Tasha blinked, but Data continued, “You showed clear signs of arousal. It was…unexpected, but not entirely unwelcome. You were extremely professional in spite of your attraction to me, which I appreciated. You are…a good friend. I have come to care about you greatly.”

“That’s…great.” Tasha felt a bit like she’d hit a brick wall, and yet was still moving. Like she’d left her brain somewhere back on the other side. She blinked, trying to catch up. “Data, people treat you like you’re a walking sex doll just waiting for the right commands to activate. I’m supposed to be your friend, and I-“

“Professed that you cared deeply about me,” Data repeated. “Indicated that our friendship was as significant to you are it is to me. You told me you considered me beautiful in many ways, both physically and mentally. That you liked me for who I am, and that you wanted to make love to me, because you believed I deserved someone who loved me as you do.” Data hesitated, and then reached out, taking Tasha’s hands in both of hers. Tasha stared down at the touch. “You appear to believe that you used me in some manner, and that this is immoral and unacceptable,” Data said. “If the experience was distressing for you, I apologize, but it was not so for me.”

“It…wasn’t?”

“My sexuality programming is extensive, but in practice I am extremely limited,” Data admitted. “Our liaison was…unexpected, but fulfilling. Pleasurable.” She squeezed Tasha’s hands carefully. “You are my friend, Tasha. You did not take advantage of me. At no point during the interaction did I believe that you expected me to reciprocate simply because I was programmed to, or that if I had said no, that you would have reacted poorly.”

“I wouldn’t have,” Tasha murmured. She might have been upset at being rejected, but she had hardly expected Data to say yes in the first place. “If you’d said no…I would have been disappointed, but it would have been okay.”

“Because I am your friend.”

“Exactly.”

“And because you do not see me as a ‘sexbot.’”

Tasha blushed at Data’s wry, pointed tone. “No,” she said. “I don’t. It might be part of your programming, but that doesn’t mean that’s all you’re good for.”

“But you were concerned that I would think otherwise.”

Tasha pulled her hands away from Data, wrapping them around herself defensively. She stared at the floor, at their matching uniform boots, toe to toe. “I wasn’t even sure you were attracted to women. I mean…I wasn’t sure you were attracted to _anybody_. And the way people keep coming on to you…I didn’t want to be just another person who did that to you. I didn’t want you to feel pressured.”

“Tasha, I am significantly stronger than you, and programmed to defend myself,” Data pointed out. “It would be extremely difficult for you to pressure me into anything.” She hesitated. “As for attraction…I do not believe it is the same as humans experience. But…I am attracted to you, Tasha. In what ways I can be.”

Tasha blinked. She lifted her head. Data met her eyes, her expression open and unguarded, waiting for her to make the next move. Carefully, Tasha cradled Data’s cheek, her fingers hesitant against the soft skin. Data leaned into the touch, and when Tasha ran her thumb over Data’s lower lip, ever so gently, Data inhaled softly. “I want to be really clear,” Tasha said quietly. “You can say no, and that’s okay. We can still be friends, and I won’t tell you how beautiful you are to me, how your eyes are the last thing I think about at night and the first thing I think about when I wake up. I won’t ever make you feel like you owe me anything for wanting you, for thinking that I could spend the rest of my life happy knowing you were in it. If you say no, I will back down. If you tell me to, I’ll even walk away entirely. But you are the most amazing woman I’ve ever met, and if you say yes-“

“Yes.”

Tasha blinked. Both women were hardly breathing. Tasha knew Data didn’t have to, but still. She persisted, “I don’t want to be a social experiment for you, okay? I can’t be Human Sexuality 101.”

“You would not be.” Data’s eyes were soft. There was clear longing in them. “If I intended to study human sexuality in that manner, there are dozens of partners I could have sought out before you. I said no to them. I am saying yes to you.”

“You’re sure?”

“I am certain.”

It was too much. Getting the girl…that was a fantasy. A fairytale. It wasn’t supposed to happen.

And yet.

Her hand was still on Data’s cheek. Data’s eyes flicked to her lips, and then back again. They were standing close, almost too close in the empty hallway, breathing the same air. They were both here, and Data wasn’t disgusted with Tasha for what had happened. She was saying yes.

Tasha was too frozen to move, too awe-struck to act, so Data did it for her. The android leaned in, her lips just as soft sober, warm and sweet against Tasha’s as she kissed her, and Tasha shuddered, fisting her fingers into Data’s hair, closing her eyes as she kissed back for all she was worth. It was entirely possible that other people were rounding the corner, seeing them locked in their embrace. Tasha didn’t care. At that moment, there was absolutely nowhere she would have rather been.

Lieutenant Commander Data deserved the absolute best. She deserved someone who loved her as she was, who would listen to her expound on whatever topic had caught her eye. Who would laugh at her attempts at humor, but never at her for trying. Someone who saw just how beautiful she was, but knew that she was so much more than a pretty face and some programming. Tasha wasn’t sure she was the best. She wasn’t sure she was everything that Data deserved. But she would be damned if she didn’t spend the rest of her life trying.


End file.
